Home Coming
by Kandros Fir
Summary: A Fire Nation soldier returns home and finds that it is difficult to readjust. Of course having no other skills than fire bending and widespread discrimination against veterans of the hundred years war doesn't help. Feeling alienated and cut off from his nation, Ryuu is haplessly swept up in a conspiracy to topple the throne and restart the Hundred Years War.
1. Chapter 1

When his father and his friends had come home from the war there had been parades and cheering. The whole village had come to celebrate the return of the heroes.

Now Ryuu was returning home and his village simply stared at him in hostile silence. This confused Ryuu. Why did they look upon him as the enemy? He had served honorably as a fire nation soldier, and while it wasn't the profession he would have chosen for himself, he acquitted himself wonderfully on the battlefield, and had been at the front lines when the great walled city of Konkoku, second only to Ba Sing Se, had fallen. But these stares made him feel as if he had done something dishonorable.

He simply stood taller in the face of all those stares and berated himself for his reaction. So what if his village didn't understand what he did? He hadn't done anything wrong. He was simply serving his country in any way it needed him. There was no reason to feel ashamed.

But still, he can't help remember the offer that his superior made him as the Firelord ordered the army to demobilize; his superior was planning on going into business and wanted someone he could trust to help with it and invest some funds into it.

He then saw his mother in the middle of the crowd waiting for him. She was the reason he had turned down that offer. He had a close relationship with her ever since his father had been drafted into the army when he was four. She had been alone in raising him and they had become extremely close then. There were times when he had even forgotten he had a father. Then his father died soon after being discharged from an old war wound, and Ryuu had to take care of his mother this time.

He barely restrained the urge to run to her and bury himself in her arms. He was an adult now, no longer that little boy whose whole world was his mother. But he could not stop his pace from quickening as he walked towards her. As she got closer he noticed her give him a troubled smile, as if she wasn't sure of how she felt about him coming back and Ryuu's felt the desire for a hug vanish and instead felt like getting on his knees and sobbing right there.

He didn't of course, he simply slowed down and when he reached his mother he greeted her in a cool voice, "Hello mother, I hope you are doing well," a far cry from the warmth and security he had hoped would be in their reunion.

She greeted him back, saying, "Welcome home Ryuu."

As far as Ryuu was concerned, no statement could be farther from the truth.

As the they walk home hand in hand, he swears he hears people muttering, "Murdered," and "baby killer," in the background.

He really shouldn't have come back.

A/N: Once again I am tackling a subject that authors much better than I should write about. And I have like three other unfinished stories. Oh well.


	2. Chapter 2

It has been two months since he has come home, two years since the war has ended and only half a year since the establishment of Republic city. Ryuu is miserable. He no longer fits into his village. Whenever anyone asks about the war, it is only to inquire about the war crimes that have come to light, the torture of prisoners by fire nation soldiers or the burning any earth kingdom soldiers who surrender.

Whenever Ryuu tries to explain to his village that he wasn't behind any of that, that he tried to fight an honorable war as far as he could, they don't seem to believe him. NO one is interested in his war stories, or even asks about his how he is doing.

His mother has seemed to accept him back, but her response to the war is that it is over, no need to discuss it. Ryuu isn't sure which attitude was worse.

For him the war would never be over. He had suffered many wounds in the course of battle. He had received a good solid spear through the gut by an earth kingdom soldier and wouldn't have survived if one of his friends who had been drafted along with him hadn't cauterized the wound. He still had the scar. He had been there at the disastrous siege of the North Pole and barely survived the rampage of whatever the hell that thing the Avatar had become through the skin of his teeth. Many of his comrades had not been so lucky.

Of course the new Fire Lord isn't helping either. Though he does not mention any names, nor does he call the soldiers monsters, his disapproval of the war turns public sentiment against it. The fire lord mentions the hardship brought about by high taxes that financed the war, along with factories polluting rivers and starving villages and war crimes in the Earth Kingdom. And as public sentiment turns against the war, it also turns against the army that fought it.

Employers quite often reject the applications of veterans and many of those who came home find it difficult to apply for any aid. Ryuu had been unsuccessful in job hunting and the last of his pension he had been granted when discharged was dwindling. In desperate financial straits, he turns to wood carving, if no one will hire him, he will just become his own boss.

His first attempts are laughable but he continues on whittling, for he has nothing else. Slowly, little by little, propelled by the force of necessity he improves. By the time six months has passed he can sell his carvings to tourists who come to the village to see how the bumpkins live. He finds it easy to hide the fact that he was a soldier. A simple change into the traditional dress of his village and growing his hair out long hides the fact he was ever in the army for he has no visible scars on his face and he doesn't look like a military man.

He tries to tell himself that he very lucky, but he cannot help but feel a hollow pang in his chest every time he sees his uniform, still a crisp red color like leaves in the fall, tucked in neatly, still in his size, and whenever he stares in the mirror to see the long haired stranger staring back. He never grows used to these moments and calls them the attrition of daily life, as they kill a small piece of him each time.

Then on June 7, 105 A.G, five years after the war, Ryuu's world flips on its axis and his life changes forever.

A/N: If you haven't guessed this is loosely based off of veteran's return from the Vietnam war, except worse. After all, there are some similarities. While the Fire Nation was ultimately winning the war had dragged on for a hundred years, they obviously couldn't pacify the rebels in the Earth kingdom, which is why they needed to burn it down and it was expensive in turns of manpower and resources needed.


End file.
